When Elvis Presley died in 1977, he became a kind of joke for many. Fully, increasingly isolated and obsessed with fast food and amphetamines, he looked like a tough caricature of a thin-whipped rocker that revolutionized popular culture in the 1950s.
His chaotic life and early death were presented as a careful story, and like all the good fairy tales, it had a villain — his manager, Colonel Parker.
“Colonel” undoubtedly helped Elvis gain worldwide fame early in his career, but then milked his cash cow to death and signed a disastrous parade of bad movies. God in a parody who up and locked him in a Las Vegas settlement and turned it into a rock.
Of course, the colonel was neither a colonel nor a gentleman in the south. He was a Dutch scammer, Dries van Kuijk, and he reinvented his persona so well that he was almost convinced.
Baz Luhrmann’s ElvisHe bossed the show from start to finish, playing with Tom Hanks’ winks and smiles, barely recognizable under the swaying sea of ​​prostheses. From the bed of his death, it is the Colonel who insists on looking back at the haze of morphine and giving him his side of the story.
In 1955, he managed the Tour Carnival and represented country crewer Hank Snow when he heard strange sounds from record players.
It ’s an Elvis song. It’s okay momAn incendiary single that will soon drop a bomb on the music industry. Parker thinks this kid might have something, especially when he turns out to be white instead of black, while the country is frowning around him.
Elvis (Austin Butler) is from a poor, mostly African-American neighborhood in Tupelo, Mississippi, and grew up immersing himself in black culture, RnB, and gospel. Typical American sound.
And while proper music people like Sun Records’ Sam Phillips hear something sacred in Elvis’ early work, the Colonel hears the money and puts his claws in the tears of Tennessee as soon as possible. ..
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Later, Rahman’s films magically compete for the next 20 years of Presley’s short, action-packed life.
Helen Thompson plays Gladys Presley, a powerful proprietress dedicated to her boy. Olivia Dejon is Priscilla Wagner, who was only 14 when Elvis met her, but eventually became his only wife, with a fleeting cameo from something like BB King (Kelvin). Harrison Jr.), Little Richard (Alton Mason), Sister Rosetta Tharpe (Yora Carti).
Much has been said about Presley’s early connection to African-American culture, but little mention of his ardent republicanism and Richard Nixon’s enthusiastic support. It’s hard to cover a life like him, but there may have been a better way.
Rahman’s style is well known — with all the jump edits and short attention spans, his camera races from scene to scene, with little rest on anything.Like that scene, there are wonderful moments It’s okay mom Is first heard, or the section where we see Elvis, a great arranger, preparing his band for those legendary early Las Vegas shows.
But Presley’s attitude towards music is embarrassing. One song is rarely played completely, and the songs we hear are thrown away in the gimmick overlay. Butler is pretty good for a young and arrogant Presley, but every time we start to get a sense of Elvis, the Colonel staggers in front of him and obscures our sights.
The decision to charge Parker virtually the same as Presley is problematic, and as a result we only drown in the confusing reflexes of the dying sister and skirt the life and people of the great artist. ..
It’s an opportunity I missed, a relatively simple biography like that Walk the line, Would have worked much better. Perhaps some kind of soul will make it.
Rating: 2 stars
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Ethan Hawke is a terrifying grabber as a murderer
Black phone (16, 102 minutes)
Scott Derrickson’s half-brain horror movie Black phone Based on Joe Hill’s short story, it was set in the small town of Denver in 1978. Something is wrong in a Little League game or a dangerous flare.
When Finney (Mason Thames) returns home from school with his sister Gwen (Madeleine Maglow), he gives him a poster of the missing children. Finney knows some of them and is about to become himself as a serial killer known as a “grabber” robs him from the street.
Finney comes to the soundproof basement. There he occasionally visits Grabber (Ethan Hawke). Grabber unhinge at the same time and speak calmly, but there is no doubt about what will happen next.
On the wall, an old, unconnected black phone rings eerily at night, and when Finney answers, he hears the voice of the victim of Grabber, urging him to escape.
Black phone It might have been easily overly annoying, but instead it has a little surrealistic quality of Brothers Grimm’s fairy tales, but it solves at an unsightly speed.
Rating: 3 stars
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A group of French prisoners is inspired by the Beckett classic
Big hit (15A, 105 minutes)
It’s unlikely, but it should be based on the true story, Emmanuel Courcol’s cartoon drama big hit Starring Kad Merad as Etienne. Etienne is a frequently unemployed actor who works to run a drama workshop in a French prison.
Surprised by the raw talent he found there, he encourages them to rehearse Samuel Beckett’s absurd classics. Waiting for Godo. “Some boring guys are waiting for someone to never come,” he tells them. “You’re familiar.” The play speaks to prisoners, so Etienne has a great idea of ​​taking the show on tour.
The improbable adventure that follows takes him and his player’s villain band through the countryside to the Odéon Theater in Paris, where nasty surprises await.
big hit The story wears its heart on its sleeves, even though it is inspired by the actual production of prisons. Waiting for Godo In Sweden, it feels a little unnatural. But it’s heartwarming and there is a moment. Melado is excellent as Etienne, and his good intentions are slightly undermined by the fact that he is anxious to be in the limelight.
Rating: 3 stars
